Kinetics of Polymer Degradation in the Solid State

Interpreting the Kinetics of Polymer Degradation in the Solid State 

The biphasic kinetics curve for the reactions of polymers is very typical and is found frequently in the polymer literature. Daglen and Tyler showed62 that equation 27 gave excellent fit to these systems as well, which suggests the presence of reaction spheres is common in the mechanism of solid-state polymer photodegradation. 

FIGURE 5. Kinetics plot showing the disappearance of polymer 7 as a function of time in seconds. 

SCHEME 10. A generalized reaction scheme showing photolysis of a bond along the backbone in a polymer (M, a generic atom, carbon or otherwise). 

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